The Villain Arc
by Lynyrd Lionheart
Summary: Emma goes dark, but Killian is still unable to leave her side.
1. The Villain Arc

**AN: The foreshadowing for Killian not giving up on Emma when she goes dark was strong in tonight's episode. So I wrote it.**

**The Villain Arc**

The others have hidden away, plot ways to stop her, to bring her back to herself, but remains at her side. It amuses her, he knows, to have him there – her personal lapdog, as the sea witch likes to call him, with a sneer and eyes that flash with hatred. The second Emma decides he's no longer amusing, he knows that Ursula will end him before he can get away. Once, that would have sent him running, fleeing to save his own neck. But this is not once, this is now, and this is Emma. So while Snow and Dave and Regina hide and try to think of ways to talk sense into the Saviour, he follows her, loyal lapdog to the end.

"You're just as stupid as they are, you know," she tells him, when she and the witches and the Dark One call an end to their plotting for the night. Killian isn't allowed to sit in on those meetings, not when his loyalty is strictly to Emma, rather than what they hope to achieve.

"Stupid. I've never been called that before."

"Maybe not when you were Captain Hook," Emma replies, taking the seat across from him. She curls her legs up into her chest, rests her chin on her knee and looks at him. She looks as she always has – blonde and beautiful and dressed in a red leather jacket – but her eyes are different. There's a shadow to them now, a shadow matched by the one that mars her once white magic. The savior, well and truly tainted. "Captain Hook, he knew how to survive. He knew not to trust anyone but himself to have his back. But Killian Jones? He's a stupid man, all about self-sacrifice."

At first he allows the words to sting, but Killian _knows_ Emma Swan. He knows her when she's filled with light magic and playing the role of savior, and despite her best efforts, he knows here when she's dark and tainted and filled with hatred for the whole damn world. He knows her voice, her expressions, and he knows what he's seeing in her now.

"Why, Swan, I think you might be worried for me."

Her head snaps up at the accusation, a sneer on her lips, but he knows not to look at her lips. He looks at her eyes, wide and green and filled with shadows, but also with that spark of fear. He remembers it well, from when he had stood under jagged ice the Snow Queen meant to use to kill him. She can have all the darkness in the world in her heart, but she can't hide the emotions that still manage to fight through.

And if she can worry… well, there is a reason Killian refuses to give up on her, even when all the pleas of her family fall on death ears, waved away with a hand and tumult of shadowed magic.

"Don't give yourself that much credit, _Hook_. I find it entertaining, how desperate you are for the dregs of my affections. It will bore me, and so will you" – she gets to her feet and walks up to him, settles herself on his lap. She does this often, and Killian always seems to let her. She runs her hands up his chest, sending goose bumps down his arms, and then pulls the collar of his shirt into a tight grip – "eventually. You'll bore me eventually."

He wants to ask her who she's trying to convince – him or herself – but she knows that he likes to talk, and so she silences him with her lips before he can do so. It's not like the kisses she had once given him – soft and full of promise. Her kisses these days are rough and demanding, orders for more. They're fighting tongues and clashing teeth, and battles for dominance that she refuses to lose.

Killian cradles her head with his hands, gentles the kiss, until he's just brushing his lips against hers, forcing sweetness and affection when all she wants is lust and passion.

She lets out an angry snarl and pulls away from him.

"I _don't_ love you," she growls out, her voice angry. But her eyes are at odds with her words, because for the briefest moment, the shadows aren't there, and instead it's just pure, raw _pain_ and the Emma that Killian is so desperate to regain. He sees that, and he knows for certain that those words are meant for herself, not for him. He lets himself look into her eyes for a moment, searching, and then he cups her cheek, pulling her into another of those gentle kisses. She plants her hands on his shoulder, and he prepares himself to be shoved back once more. It's how it always ends, when he does this. Whenever he's gentle, she throws him back with her magic, and he's left to wonder if it's the time when she decides he brings out things in her that she can't afford, not if she wants to maintain this new darkness of hers.

Her hands clutch his shoulders, and he freezes for a second in shock, because she's never done that before, and he's almost afraid that it's a trick.

"What are you doing to me," she whispers when he pulls back carefully. Her eyes are screwed shut, but a tear has escaped, trailing down her cheek, and he reaches up to wipe it away.

"Loving you, Emma," he replies, stroking her skin softly. "I'm afraid I don't know how to do anything else. Not anymore."

"Love is weakness," she says, eyes snapping open to glare at him.

"There was a time when you thought the opposite," Killian responds, and already his heart is aching, because he's losing her again. He saw her for a moment, the Emma he had fallen so in love with, but now he can see her vanishing again. He pulls her down, pressing their foreheads together, desperate to keep her, desperate to see those shadows dissipate again.

"That was before," she says, her voice becoming cold. "Before I learned the truth."

"What truth?" Killian demands, running his hand through his hair in frustration, because she's pulled away and gotten to her feet once more. "The truth that your parents aren't perfect? That they're human and they make mistakes just like the rest of us?"

"They lied to me!" she shouts, spinning so her back is to him. Then she lets out a sound of frustration and spins back. "They lied to me. Kept secrets and then lied right to my face, and you dare to try to defend them?"

"You're talking like those witches," Killian says, stepping towards her slowly. "And yes, what your parents did was wrong… but can you blame them? You're they're daughter."

"Yes, the precious daughter. The one they worried so much would turn evil, that they let me go to keep me good. Who does that Killian?" her voice cracks, and Killian reaches out, taking her into his arms, she fights his grip, but he maintains is, because when was the last time she called him Killian?

"Who _does_ that?" she asks again.

"I don't know," Killian admits, because he hadn't quite been able to believe it, when he had heard the truth of Maleficent's past with Snow and Dave. "I don't know, Love. But I do know that you don't want this. Darkness… once you've let it in, it's very hard to get away from."

"Like you?" she asks, and her voice is muffled by his shoulder but it cuts him to the quick all the same. She pulls back, and this time he lets her, because he knows what comes next. "You and Ursula and how you _ruined_ her because you were so selfish. You're one to talk about darkness, when you've danced with it for centuries."

"Aye," Killian admits, because lies are what got them here, and he won't be telling any more, even by omission. "Aye, let's talk about me. Shall we lay out all my sins, Emma? How I couldn't save my brother or Milah so I spent centuries destroying anything and everyone that I viewed as an obstacle to my revenge? And yes, that included Ursula. She was a good soul when I met her, and everything she is now I played a part in. Is that what you want me to admit?"

Emma steps back in surprise, so Killian takes a step forward.

"Yes, Ursula blames me for what she's become. Just as Regina blamed her mother and Rumplestiltskin and the author. Just as the Crocodile will blame his curse and Cruella will blame her past, and I blamed the Crocodile. It's all one vicious cycle, and I'll welcome you to it. Shall we blame your parents then, Love? Or do you want to blame me? Or we can blame Regina, who started this all. Really, take your pick."

"What are you doing?" Emma demanded, her fingers clenching and unclenching, and he knew he was walking a thin line, that at any moment she could unleash her powers on him, but he couldn't stop. This was the first time he had seen the true her, and if he gave up now…

What if he never saw her again?

"I'm asking who will be the start of your villain arc? Because blame is how we always start, Love. We blame someone, decide that if they were gone, we would be better. But it doesn't work that way. Because once that person is gone, that's it. It doesn't fix _anything_. So we look for another to blame. And then another, until it's a vicious cycle and remembering what started it all is nigh on impossible. And all the while, we ignore that it was our own choices that set us down our respective paths. That yes, someone did us wrong and pointed us there, but we made the decision to take that first step all on our own."

Emma stares at him with wide eyes, frozen in place. Killian takes another step forward, until they're touching, and he reaches out to twine a curl of her hair around his finger.

"So tell me, Love, who shall we choose as the beginning of you villain arc? I'll be there with you for it, because I don't know how to walk away from you. So shall we take that first step together?"

"You don't mean that," Emma whispers, and Killian leans down, brushes his lips against hers.

"But I do, Love. If this is the path you choose, then I'll help you down it… or you could do what I didn't. You can choose a different way."

Emma's lips twist up into a derisive smirk when she finally catches on to Killian's purpose, sees what he's trying to do.

"Let me guess – forgiveness? Isn't that how heroes are supposed to work? Forgive and forget, because _everyone_ deserves a second chance."

"You do," he says when Emma turns her back to him, and his words make her pause. "You deserve a second chance, Love. And I know that you'll make the right choice someday. Because I see the best of you, and I know that it will come out on top. But I worry about what you might do before then, and if, when you realize this isn't what you want, if you'll be able to survive the doing of them."

"You don't know me," she says, keeping her back to him. "You like to pretend you do, but you don't. You're just a one handed pirate with a drinking problem, and I should have never let you close to me."

"Is this where I bore you then?" Killian comes up behind her once more. "If so, I would appreciate if you were the one to end me. I think Ursula would plan to make it hurt."

"Maybe you deserve for it to hurt."

"I very likely do."

She turns to him, her hand coming up, fingers bent like claws, and he braces himself for what he knows will come next. It's been done before, courtesy of the Crocodile, and he knows that it will hurt.

Pain never comes.

"Why are you doing this?" she asks, her fingers resting over his chest, her gaze glued to her hand.

"I told you, it's because I don't know how to walk away from you. I am in love with you."

She removes her hand from his chest, takes a step back, and he looks at her, expecting to see shadows in her eyes.

Instead he sees walls. Walls that are painfully familiar, because he's scaled them once before. The heart she threatened to remove skips a beat, because walls he can fight. Walls mean she has to defend herself emotionally. Wall mean something got to her.

Walls mean _he_ got to her.

"You're lucky," she says, and her voice holds the same coldness as before, but this time he recognizes it as false. An attempt to maintain her charade, but already he can see she's unwinding. "You still amuse me. So you'll live to see another day. But I don't want to see you again tonight."

Part of him wants to argue, but there's still enough Hook left in Killian for him to know when he should walk away, if he wants to live to fight another day. So instead, he gives her the slightest of bows.

"As you wish," he replies.

Emma has turned her back to him, but he sees it stiffen at her words. He makes a note of that, and leaves the room.

Behind him, Emma sags against the wall, letting it support all of her weight, and wishes that she had it in her to let him die.

**AN: There may be a sequel. Because he got to her, but she's still not good yet… so yeah, there's a good probability for a sequel. Let me know what you think.**


	2. The Endless Spiral

**AN: Here we have the middle part of our villain arc. **

**The Endless Spiral**

She thinks that if she can just get him in her bed, just have him – all of him – just once, that maybe she'll get over this infatuation that she can't seem to shake. As long as she doesn't know what it would be like with them, he'll continue to have this power over her, continue to be the block in the road of shit she needs to get done.

It would be so much easier if he had just _left_.

Emma is used to being abandoned. She was abandoned by her parents, by August, by a trail of foster parents, and then by Neal. She's an old hat at it, knows that she can survive abandonment.

But Killian _just won't go._

_Hook_, she reminds herself, hating that she has to. That she can't think of him as the handsome but dangerous pirate, one that had no other tie to her. She tries to forget that, even then, she was telling herself that he was trouble, over and over like a mantra that she apparently never got through to her foolish heart, because he's there and refuses to leave her, and Emma can't kill him, even though she knows she should.

"You look thoughtful, Dear," Cruella drawls in that accented voice that holds nothing but boredom, for all that her words express curiosity. "Pirate on your mind?"

Ursula might want Killian – _Hook_ – to die, but Emma knows that Cruella finds him and his infatuation with her – _it's just an infatuation, it's not love_ – amusing. Just as she finds him pretty to look at, which is why the duo haired witch soothes Ursula's anger to keep the pirate alive.

"I'm contemplating what we do next," Emma responds, ever in denial. She will _never_ admit any sort of weakness to her supposed allies. They may have helped her discover her inner darkness, her inner _power_, but she doesn't trust them not to use both for their own twisted desires.

The only twisted desire Emma has any plans of sating are her own… and right now the desires revolve around Killian – _Hook, dammit!_ – who is sitting and pretending to read, but Emma knows better. He won't relax enough to read, can't even relax enough to catch more than an hour or two of sleep, until they are no longer surrounded by the Queens of Darkness.

"Yes… I'm sure that's what you're doing," Cruella replied, her gaze lingering on Hook in a way that said she knew _exactly_ what Emma would like to do. And that it had absolutely nothing to do with their upcoming plans.

"Just play your part in finding this author, Cruella. You do still want your happy ending, don't you?"

Cruella smiled and innocently held up her hands, backing off. Emma glared until the witch disappeared, and when she turned away from the door she had retreated through, Emma turned her attention back to Kill – _Hook_.

Only to find his blue, blue eyes were focused on her.

"That doesn't sound like you're playing nice with your new friends, Swan," he commented, setting aside his book. She saw on the spine that it was the complete works of Jane Austen, and it made her smirk.

"Taking wooing lessons from Mr. Darcy? Not sure it's quite your style, Captain."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," he told her with a blank expression that made her roll her eyes.

"Yeah, that's a sure sign that you _haven't_ been reading that book. Not that I really needed the proof. Let's go."

Hook, and there, she _could_ call him by the right name, looked at the cover of his book curiously for a moment, and Emma wondered if he'd pick it up later and _actually_ read it. Then again, if all things went to plan, he wouldn't have the chance.

She bit back a curse when that caused a pang, because she found herself wondering _will I have him when I change things_? And it shouldn't _matter_.

She'll have her happy ending, and give happy endings to the people her parents stole them from, to Maleficent and the child she lost.

_Will Henry be in my happy ending?_

A question that haunts her constantly, but Emma tries not to dwell on it. Her happy ending… there's no world where her happy ending doesn't include Henry. She has to believe he'll be there.

She looks at Hook again, and then away with a silent snarl. _She doesn't care._

_ She just needs to have him – all of him – once, and then he'll be out of her system and she can move on._

The problem, however, is that while she's constantly remind herself that he's Hook, these days Killian is far more apt a name. And while Hook would have happily let her take what he had to offer, Killian likes to be oh-so-noble.

Nobility isn't what Emma wants from him – she wants the goddamn pirate.

"Where are we going?" he asks, setting aside the book, and dragging Emma out of her thoughts. It's a good thing, because she had been contemplating simply ripping his shirt open and seducing him, and now isn't the time for that.

"We need to visit the mayor. I spoke to Gold, we need a thing or two that only an Evil Queen can supply."

Later, she would deny the noise that came out of her throat, but when he grasped her wrist, pulling her around so she was pinned to the wall, she actually let out a squeak of surprise.

"What the hell, Hook?" she demands, glaring at him. In an act completely unlike him, he simply glares back, and for the first time in months, Emma can see the pirate captain that lurks beneath the surface of Killian Jones.

"The Crocodile, Love?" he demands, his leg pressing between hers. "Really? Bad enough that I have to be anywhere near him, but now you'll turn me into his errand boy again?" He grabs her hand, pressing it over his chest. "Why don't you rip it out and hand it to him again. Because that's the only way I'll do what that man wants."

She wonders what it would feel like, to hold his heart in her hand again, but this time for control, not to return it. To use it to control him. She could have him on the bed, under her, begging for her –

_His heart in Gold's palm, about to be crushed, and she can't move. She can't _breathe_, and that that has nothing to do with Gold's spell, and everything to do with the thought of losing him._

For a moment, it's like she's in the clock tower again, and so afraid that she's going to lose him. The pain she felt, and then the bone deep relief when Belle showed up and ordered Gold off. And she forgets, that she swore to help Maleficent, that she wants to see her parents suffer for the things they did. She forgets that she's no longer a savior or a lost girl, but rather a powerful sorceress in her own right, and her hand clutches at the fabric that covers his heart.

It's not the Emma full of darkness that rises on her tippy toes to press her lips to his in a desperate kiss, but instead the Emma that was still having nightmares of losing him when the Queens of Darkness and the Dark One returned to Storybrooke.

His hand delves into her hair, and he kisses back just as desperately. As though he's drowning and her kiss is water, and he never wants to give it up.

And then reality hits her again, and she pushes him back, sending him into the wall across from them with a painful thud. She stays against the other wall, back pressed against it, using the hard surface to support her weight, and breathes in desperate gasps of air. That wasn't supposed to happen. He wasn't supposed to have that effect on her –

"How much longer do we do this, Emma?" he asks, pulling himself to his feet, and it's the first time since this started that she truly looks at him, truly sees the effect his is having on him.

He looks exhausted. There are shadows in and below his eyes – those shadows hold grief and darkness, and every line of his body is simply weary. For the first time since meeting him, Emma can believe that Killian is three hundred years old, because the way his shoulders slump seem to hold every one of those centuries.

"No one is making you stay," she tells him. "So why _do_ you?"

"Because I won't let the Crocodile destroy another woman I love," he snaps back, and Emma nearly sneers, because of course, it all comes back to Rumplestiltskin and their feud. But Killian curses, and runs a hand through his hair. He takes a step towards her, and Emma's spin stiffens. He notices and stops, cursing and rubbing his face. "Dammit, Swan, I won't let _you_ destroy yourself, either. Whatever you think you'll accomplish… it's not going to pan out the way you expect."

"Just because you never managed to get what you wanted, doesn't mean I'll fail too."

"Villains never win – haven't you learned that?"

"And who decides who the villain is?"

The words echo between them, holding all the weight that has been weighing Emma down ever since she discovered the truth of her parents' actions. The weight that suffocates her, because what they did was done in _her_ name… and how can she be a savior if her beginnings are soaked in treachery and darkness?

They were so desperate to keep her good… that they sacrificed _her_, that they sacrificed _another_ child, in order to keep it safe.

"Who decides, Killian?" she asks, stepping towards him, wishing that he could make this make sense, because none of it has. Not in days. "Because what my parents did? Heroes don't do that. So who writes the story? Who decides that they get a happy ending despite that, when Maleficent doesn't?"

"I…" Killian sighs again, rubs the brace of his hook against his ear. "I don't have your answers, Emma. But changing all of this? It's not the way to do it."

"Why not? Maybe… maybe you'll get Milah back. Get the life you always wanted-"

"But then I'll never have met you," his blue gaze is clear and focused on her, and the words he speaks makes her hold her breath. "Aye, I loved Milah. Part of me will always love her. But Swan…. I'm a pirate. We're a superstitious lot. And I believe that I was always meant for you. That it doesn't matter what you change in the past, I would still find a way to you."

"I didn't think you were the type to believe in fate."

"Neither did I… not until you pushed a dead body off of me and I knew that my life would never be the same for having met you. Swan, what your parents did wasn't right. No one would claim it was so… but anyone can tell that they feel guilt for what they did-"

"Let me guess, you've been sharing drinks with your good _mate_ Dave. Passing on information?"

He ignored her sneer to step up to her, to brush some of her hair over her shoulder.

"-and maybe that's why they're the heroes. Because they did what anyone might do to save their child, but they still felt guilt for it. Still felt grief. And that has to mean something. But changing the whole story? You change the very things that forged us. And Swan, I wouldn't trade a single moment with you to redo anything in my past."

The terrifying, beautiful thing is that she can tell he's telling her the truth. And it makes her stumble back from him. Because what he's saying…

_Milah, Liam, his hand… who knows what other horrors he encountered in three hundred years?_

… he's saying that _she_ made all of it worth it.

"I promised I'd get Maleficent her happy ending-"

"Emma, you can't force other's happiness. And it's not your job to give everyone what they're looking for."

"I'm the savior. It kind of _is_ my job."

"No. It was your job to stop the curse. You stopped it. Happy endings? That's up to the owner to find themselves. If all this talk of the author is to be believed, then I'd have to doom myself to losing you. And that isn't a thought I'll entertain."

Emma turns away from him, and wonders how they got here? How did he get under her skin, manage to prick at every little piece of her that she had kept hidden –

"What if it's the only way to get _my_ happy ending. One without all of… _this_."

"This being that your parents aren't perfect? Or that the witches are trying to blame you for something you played no part in? Emma, _this_ is life. It's gritty, and difficult, and I'm sorry that our stories aren't what they were painted to be in your fairytales, but life isn't like that. Not even a life with magic as we've led."

"Snow White and Prince Charming are supposed to be _good_."

"And those people you read about aren't _real_. David and Mary Margaret? They _are_ good people. But good does not mean perfect. And that's why this author quest is a load of bollocks. Because our stories might be told in the pages of that book, but the fact that we're here now shows that we're not just pictures in books. And no sorcerer has the ability to make our decisions for us. Villains don't lose because they're villains – they lose because they never accept the blame for their own actions. Take it from a man that was a villain for far longer than he's been good. We take the easy way out… and breaking old habits can be difficult, but it _can_ be done."

"So you want me to just walk away and let Maleficent suffer?"

"I want you to let Maleficent make her own path, because it's _hers_, and that you think you can take responsibility for that? It makes you rather arrogant, Swan."

She spins to glare at him.

"Arrogant? What the hell do you know?"

"You're acting as though you have any right to control the actions and choices of others. So aye, Swan. _Arrogant_."

She feels the cold darkness of her tainted magic fall over her as she steps towards him, and she sees his confidence falter, though he refuses to back down. She considers it again, ripping out her heart, but when the memory of that day in the clock tower…

_No_. She won't do that again.

"Are you going to make my choices for me now, Emma?" he asks when she's a mere half foot from him.

"You should go," she tells him, and thinks that she could _make_ him go. Could banish him to his good friend Dave's side.

"Do it, Swan. And I'll just come back. Again… and again… and again."

"Arrogant, isn't it? To think you can control what I do and don't do?"

"I've always been an arrogant man."

They're at a stalemate, because she refuses to back down, but she can't bring herself to do it, to either send him away or rip away his free will.

Suddenly, the defiance seems to drain out of him and he stumbles forward, leaning his head on her shoulder.

"Don't go somewhere I can't go, Emma."

Emma stiffens, but Killian's arms wrap around her, and after a beat, she wraps hers around him in return, burying her face in his hair and breathing in his scent.

"What do I do, Killian?" she asks, her grip on him tight.

"Stay with me," he replies. "Just… stay with me."

Emma doesn't say anything, simply holds him and wishes that things were different. That her parents hadn't turned out to be so… _not a fairytale_. That she knew what to do about Maleficent and the guilt that filled her.

That she had the strength to either let Killian go, or wholeheartedly choose him and walk away from the dark path she danced with.

"I can't go back to them."

"You will," he says to her, his voice filled with such promise that she almost believed him. "Someday, you will. Until then… just stay with me, Swan. That's the first step."

Emma says nothing and lets Killian hold her a little tighter. She holds up her hand behind his back, magic flickering around it – shadowed and tainted. She fists her hand, clenching her jaw as the magic dissipates.

She wished it was that simple.

**AN: And there it is. Emma is struggling, but can't quite get over the darkness and the guilt. There will be a third part, which will finish this whole thing out.**


End file.
